Geography 291: Geospatial Analysis with Desktop GIS

Chapter 4-  This chapter dealt a lot with incorporating databases and data tables into ArcGIS Pro. This was the first chapter where we created our own map at the beginning instead of starting with one of the templates and preset data/feature classes. I think that creating the folder connections was slightly confusing and that I may have messed this part up slightly because my map did not look quite the same as the picture in the book. I think this part of the book is helpful because it teaches you how to import data sets and isolate variables to look at data easily. The first part of this chapter also showed me how to join a feature class attribute table with a data table. Once you join these two, you can then calculate the sums, and in the tutorial, I was able to calculate the percentage of the population that is less than 20 years old. Again, I think this is a really efficient way of isolating certain portions of the dataset that are more relevant to what you may be interested in. The ending of the second tutorial was slightly confusing, as it was coding in Python, which I have very little experience with, but I tried my best and followed the book closely to perform these actions. Some of the commands and buttons that the book mentioned were not in my Contents pane, so some of the tutorials were a little difficult. Also, this chapter went over how to make a date-range selection query and how to save it and use it later. This action selects certain points that fall within the date range specified. I also created a query for crime types, which selected only certain types of crime from the entire dataset. The queries can be used for a multitude of things, and the book even went over how to search for a specific person who committed a crime based on specific attributes. This chapter also built on knowledge from a previous tutorial and had me make a choropleth map, which I had to turn back a few chapters to remind myself how. I also reviewed how to make graduated symbols on a map. 

Chapter 5- This chapter went over map projections and different coordinate systems. Some of the tutorials were pretty short and just went over basic actions like how to change the coordinate systems, so this chapter went by pretty fast. Also, many of these tutorials went over how to use government databases to download geospatial data into ArcGIS and then project the data on the map. I was able to extract the raster features for Hennepin County and display land use and water features (although I think my screenshot of this map may have been left behind on one of the computers in the lab). As many other people have mentioned, the 5-5 and 5-6 tutorials were a bit messed up, and I was actually able to locate the correct columns in the Excel spreadsheet, but for some reason, my spreadsheet would not import correctly and display in ArcGIS, so I’m not sure what was going on. One thing I have noticed as I’m moving through these tutorials is that ArcGIS Pro updates very frequently, but the textbooks are not able to keep up with these updates quick enough, so many times the directions do not entirely match the locations and names of commands on ArcGIS. Other than the hiccup with the database, I was able to move through chapter 5 well. 

Chapter 6- Chapter 6 took a little time because I had to be really particular when manipulating the data to dissolve the block groups. Chapter 6 overall went a little more in-depth about the variety of tools available on ArcGIS Pro, like the Pairwise Dissolve tool, Clip, and some others to either combine or clip certain parts of the map to study them better. I was having trouble with some of the steps in Chapter 6-2, in the Your Turn section where we had to use the Select by Location tool to find where Manhattan Streets intersected with another layer. I think I played around with all of the options in the Select By Location section to the point where it at least looked like the picture in the book, and that was the closest I could get. Also, this chapter went over how to merge feature classes, and I was able to merge the bodies of water within New York City and all the waterfront parks in New York City. Another tool that I learned to use in this chapter was the Union tool, and I was able to calculate the total areas and acreage selected using this tool. Overall, I think this chapter was a little challenging, but it gave me a better understanding of some of the geoprocessing tools in ArcGIS Pro. 

Chapter 7- I actually really enjoyed the content in chapter 7, so this chapter seemed to move by really fast for me. This chapter went over some cartography skills and how to edit polygon features so that they fit the basemap better. Sometimes, the building polygons are not quite in the right spot, so you have to manually select them and move them to be in the right spot. Other times, you have to add vertices or rotate the polygon so that it fits well. I was having a little bit of trouble with the vertex points when I had to cut out some of the polygons in a U-shaped building, and the points weren’t placing initially, but I got it after repetitively clicking for a while. Also, sometimes polygons can be in one big massive shape over 2 different buildings, so you have to manually split the polygon and go into the attribute tables to add in the two specific names of the buildings. This chapter let us practice creating a feature class again, then we got to actually create polygons over oddly shaped parking lots. Cartography tools like the Smoothing Tolerance were also used to smooth the edges of grassy areas and ponds/lakes when the edges are a bit harsher than they are in real life. I had a bit of trouble rotating the building in chapter 7-4, but I was able to do the rest of the tutorial where I classified the layers.

Chapter 8- This chapter was very short and only had two tutorials that were both pretty easy. This chapter mainly went over geocoding and we were working with very large sets of data. Essentially, this chapter went over how to rematch addresses from a datasheet. I was surprised that it had data in Ohio too! Again, there’s not much to write about in this chapter other than the tutorials were pretty easy to understand and we were able to work with some ZIP codes and manipulate the symbology again.

Chapter 4

• 4.1-4.2: Incredibly confusing and frustrating, there were too many different instructions to browse to different folders that I didn’t even know existed or was extremely difficult to navigate this part Could not complete these parts as they all act as one part and towards the end of 4.1, the gdb files stopped displaying properly or were corrupted and I was unable to find the cause and didn’t want to restart after attempting to solve the problem for about three hours.
• 4.3: Still long and too many things to keep track of, but I was able to get an idea of creating data ranges. This part of the chapter also broke around ¾ of the way through though and despite doing what the instructions said verbatim, the attributes table was not displaying the correct numbers.
• 4.4: Short and to the point, a nice refresher from the other ones. I had forgotten how to make colored maps though so I had to relearn that part quickly.
• 4.5: Easy to do, but I still don’t have a clue what a ‘centroid’ is given that the book doesn’t attempt to make any of the definitions in layman’s terms.
• 4.6: Discusses joining different datasets for use in tables. Again not entirely sure what that entails but I got it done somehow.

Chapter 5:

• 5.1: Discusses different coordinate systems used over time and how to change the appearance of a map based on the circumstances.
• 5.2: Very short, not entirely sure what changed by switching to the Albers equal area projection.
• 5.3: It is very interesting to see the opaque white layer over the actual map and watching where things such as roads and rivers intersect on the covering layer.
• 5.4: Adding the X/Y data was almost impossible as it’s listed elsewhere from what it says in the book. Seeing the completed overlay was interesting though.
• 5.5: Discusses adding US census data to a table. Unable to finish as some of the listed excel files in the book did not exist in the file.
• 5.6: While using the raster data to create a legend of land use in the US was interesting, like several other chapter tutorials, this one also did not work as the Raster file was too large for the program to handle, even when extracting it from Living Atlas like the textbook instructed.

Chapter 6

• 6.1: Not particularly interesting nor did I really understand what the section was trying to teach me.
• 6.2: The select feature and seeing the outlined blue zones was interesting, but I did get stuck at the end when it wanted me to ‘select intersecting streets’.
• 6.3: It is cool, if not somewhat satisfying, to be able to merge the individual water sections into one layer.
• 6.4: Short and to the point, I understand adding data to the attributes data as shown.
• 6.5: Another straightforward section in which I felt for the most part that I knew what was going on.
• 6.6: Aside from a small issue when joining the table, this section went fairly smoothly.
• 6.7: Very straight to the point, though I’m not entirely sure what changed or happened in this section.

Chapter 7

• 7.1: Short, straightforward, and easy to understand. Cool to be able to pick up a ‘location’ and move/rotate its outline to match with the structure.
• 7.2: Took a long time to figure out since there is no transparency slider but also making an outline isn’t as simple as connecting points as it creates an area for you so that required some trial and error. The snapping tool also did not match perfectly with the streets and only made straight lines.
• 7.3: Very short and easy, not much else to say.
• 7.4: Took me way too long to figure out what I was doing with the linking but I got there. Also side note but the shown building has an uncanny resemblance to Stuy Hall.

Chapter 8

• 8.1: Had a couple of bumps getting to do what it wanted me to do but otherwise all was fairly straightforward. Interesting to see just how much data there actually is. Adding zip code dots to the map was also kinda cool as well as zooming out and seeing the overall map with all the red dots and clusters.
• 8.2: Followed on and expanded on some of what was done in the previous section. Again, lots of data to work with that makes it a little confusing. Not entirely sure what I did as it all felt somewhat like a repeat of 8.1

Chapter 1 Introducing ArcGIS: Navigation, symbolizing, labeling, 2D / 3D Maps

1.1 

 Feature Class: The basic building block for displaying graphic features on a map. They are vector data with corresponding attributes for each feature.

Raster Dataset: A major type of spatial data that creates a raster, an image made up of pixels. A good example is satellite imagery.

File geodatabase: A folder with the extension .gdp that stores feature classes, raster datasets, and other related files.
Basemap: A layer that helps orient users to a location. Additional feature classes are placed on top of a basemap to provide specific information for visualization, analysis, or problem solving. 

1.2 

• You can search for features using attribute values, such as the name of a street. 
• Some feature classes can be set to be seen only when zoomed to a certain scale
• You can access preset locations and scales using spatial bookmarks
• You can read the attribute data of any feature by clicking the feature to show a pop up

1.3

• Attributes allow you to search for useful information and mapped features
• You can change the order of attribute columns in a table, change the names, see the data type of attributes, delete attributes, and make only certain attributes visible in the Fields of View menu
• Press and hold shift with the selection tool on to select any subset of points. Hold shift and click to select one more multiple, hold control to deselect. 
• The summary statistics tool can compute maximum, minimum, mean, and SD and writes the results on a new table

1.4

• Symbols of feature classes can be changed by color, size, and shape
• Features can be labeled with different fonts with added halos for improved readability
• The contrast in population density within an urban area is difficult to appreciate using color symbology. 3D makes an impressive difference.

Chapter 2: 3D maps, dot density maps, visibility ranges, point symbols, symbolizing maps

2.1 

• Thematic map: Consists of a subject layer or layers placed in spatial context with other layers, such as streets and political boundaries. TO choose layers for a thematic map, ask the questions “What layer or layers are needed to represent the subject” and “what spatial context layers are needed to orient map users to recognize locations and patterns of subject features?”. Often, but not always, the subject of thematic maps are vector layers (points, lines, or polygons)
• An overall goal of thematic maps is to make the subject prominent while placing spatial context layers in the background
• Lighter colors help reduce distraction and clutter, especially with border colors

2.2 

• Two forms of text in ArcGIS are labels and pop-ups.
• Functions for labeling are a little spread out between different tabs and access points, a little confusing to remember where all are located.

2.3

• A definition query cam limit the features displayed to a desired subset of the larger collection, based on the values in the feature attribute table
• A definition query is different from “Select By Attribute (ch.1)” because it is used to filter the features of a layer rather than select a temporary subset to work with. They both have a similar SQL (Structured Query Language) interface
• Find Definition Query under right clicking the feature and selecting properties
• Using an ‘Or’ connector makes a compound condition, so any record satisfying one of the two simple conditions will be displayed. If ‘and’ was used instead, no records would be selected because a facility cannot have more than one code value. 
• Different shapes for symbology are important for users with color blindness or still being able to be distinguishable in black and white  copies 
• Figure features are brightly colored and ground features are shades of grey

2.4

• Numeric elements attributes should be broken into relatively few classes of roughly 3-9. 
• To symbolize map features, you need only the sex of maximum values for the class, called break points. The minimum value is included in the class, but the maximum goes in the next classification. 
• A choropleth map uses color in polygons to represent numeric attribute values, generally increasing in darkness of color where  shade would represent increasing value. 
• Classification methods are used to display choropleth maps, and the default method is Natural Breaks (Jenks), which uses an algorithm to cluster values of the numeric attributes into groups, with boundaries of the groups (break points) defining classes
• The Quantile method is easily understood and provides information about the shape of a distribution. It breaks a distribution into classes, each with the same percentage of data points. For example, quantiles with 4 classes each have 25% of the data observations
• Other methods are the Defined Interval Method (uniform distribution with easily read numbers for break points) and the Geometric Interval method (increasing width interval distribution of break points)
• Many attributes have skewed distribution
• To make a 3D map, select feature layer, go to extrusion group, type, then base height. 

2.5

• Graduated and proportional point symbols: Proportionally sized point symbols can display data such as a larger symbol indicating a larger data value

2.6

• Chropleth maps of normalized population data have different uses from those of choropleth maps of population
• Dividing a segment of the population by the total population to provide info about the makeup of an area = Normalizing
• Density maps can also be normalized. Dividing population and other variables by their polygon areas, yielding a measure of spatial concentration.
• Geometric Interval Method works well for representing the long tails of distributions skewed to the right, but the breakpoints aren’t easily read
• Comparing a symbology layer through import layer and swipe to compare features can allow a quick visual comparison between datasets 

2.7

• Dot density maps can denote quantitative values. An advantage over choropleth maps is that more than one variable can be displayed at the same time using different colored dots

2.8

• GIS uses visibility ranges to automatically turn layers and labeling on and of, depending on zoom level
• Map scale: The ratio of the distance between one point and another on your screen divided by the distance between the same two points in inches on the ground
• Map scale is unitless, as a ratio that divides units. Therefore, you can use any distance unit
• Scale is counterintuitive, similar to SAV ratios. The large number is actually a smaller scale, and the smaller is actually larger. 
• Large scale shows feature labels turned on when zoomed in, and off when out. Features can also be turned off when zoomed in. 
• Features and labels can have different visibility ranges to reduce clutter

Chapter 3: Maps for End Users: Building map layouts and charts, sharing maps on ARCGIS Online, use MapViewer in ArcGIS Online, Story Maps/Dashboards

3.1 

• If making a report, it’s better to keep tables and maps as stand alone figures so they are separate and your layout is simple and clear
• Right click a layout figure, click properties, under elements and placement size, you can change the sizing to be the same as other figures or resize a figure. Under layout, then Map, use Full Extent to make the figure properly fit the new sizing. 
• Right click on the ruler to add a guide to place figures at the same boundary lines, and then drag them to the guide boundary lines to ‘snap’ them in place
• ArcGIS will automatically generate and design a legend. Can be found under Insert -> map surrounds -> legend

3.2

• To share/publish a map online, you must change a property of the map. You must also have a basemap layer. Right click the map under contents, click properties and then under general, make sure the ‘allow assignment of unique numeric IDs for web sharing…” is checked
• You can modify map settings on the arcgis website

3.3

• ArcGIS story maps allows you to create stories that include web based interactive maps, text, images, videos, and other content

Chapter 4:

4.1 – I do not have this section

4.2 – I do not have this section

4.3 –  Had a difficult time with this section, it kept saying invalid syntax and I am not sure what was wrong.

4.4 –  This tutorial was very short and made it incredibly easy to follow.

4.5 – Very easy to understand.

4.6 – Easiest tutorial to follow, the hierarchy table was interesting.

 

Chapter 5:

5.1 – This map was very interesting because it is different from what we have been making and is now a curved map.

5.2 – This section had many coordinates on the map. 

5.3 – This section is easy as I feel it is just to get used to the coordinates. 

5.4 – This section kept failing, and the tutorial was very confusing. 

5.5 – I had troubles with this section, the excel sheet was not working and downloading the tiger files gave me trouble.

5.6 – This section was easy,

 

Chapter 6:

6.1 – This section was very easy. It got me used to the attribute tables again.

6.2 – Had difficulty with the outlining part of the section and was unable to figure out how to get the rest of the blocks 

6.3 – Section was not difficult, all I had to do was search for the merge tool

6.4 -I am having an issue inserting the input dataset, I think the data in 6.2 I had trouble with was supposed to be saved and put into this section.

6.5 –  This section was very easy and I did not have any issues 

6.6 – I was having trouble with the tract layers.

 

Chapter 7:

7.1 –  This section was easy, selecting buildings was easy but splitting the last one posed a challenge.

7.2 – The tutorial was easy and had no issues.

7.3 –  This section was very easy as the only thing to do was the smooth polygon tool.

7.4 – This section was very lengthy but I was able to figure it out. 

 

Chapter 8:

8.1 – Was very simple to follow 

8.2 – My end result did not look like the photo in the book but it was very close.

Chapter 4

 

I had some issues with chapter 4. For some reason tutorials 4-1 and 4-2 did not get downloaded to the flashdrive I have all my work on so I was unable to do them. I am not sure why but this also occurred in the previous part as well. However, I was able to do the rest of the tutorials. In these I had to do filtering and linking some of data and carrying out attribute queries. I also carried out a spatial join of the burglary data along with using some more symbology. I had some issues with the last tutorial when creating a joined table however as I kept on saying I could not before the join due to the fact there was nothing to join so I am not sure what I did wrong. 

 

Chapter 5

 

The first two tutorials in the chapter went smoothly as it was just adjusting the map and the format it is viewed in. The third tutorial was also pretty straightforward in manipulating coordinate systems. However on 5-4 I had issues as when I went to go for the export features tool and went to change the output feature class, I did not have CouncilDistricts saved in my Chapter5.gdb for some reason. I am not sure what is going on with somethings not being saved or downloaded onto my flash drive but because of this I was unable to finish 5-4. I had issues again with the last two tutorials as well. I don’t think I was saving or extracting the data correctly from the outside sources. This led me to have issues importing that data into the maps.

 

Chapter 6

 

Chapter 6 was one of the longer chapters just based on how manyt tutorials there were, not so much of the content or how long they took. This chapter focused on geoprocessing which had me use various different tools to process, merge, and manage some of the data. For the most part these tutorials went smooth but often had little hiccups toward the send of sections with running some functions or joining data. However it was interesting to look at New York City again as I used to live there. 

 

Chapter 7

 

This chapter was fairly short and had us manipulating and digitizing some of the landmarks on maps. Most of this chapter was straightforward but there were areas that confusing and left me stuck when trying to mess with some of the layers and features.

 

Chapter 8

 

Short chapter talking about geocoding. In this chapter we messed with some stuff using zipcodes in various areas. I am not entirely sure what was happing however but the tutorials were straightforward besides in a few areas I had issues with but not too bad.

 

4-1: For the section “Use database utilities in the catalog pane”, I was unable to do the copy and paste sections from part 2 and 3, paste just wasn’t showing up for me. I was able to finish the rest of the section, and since it asked you to delete everything at the end, it ultimately didn’t matter.

 Screenshot (22).png

4-2: Tracts was not in my contents page for some reason. I ended up going to the catalog pane, to folders, and right clicking tracks to add it t0 the map. Showed up on my contents page then. Hope that’s right. Actually, for delete unneeded columns, my table did not end up looking like the one in the book, instead of fully deleting even though I clicked it all the unneeded columns were just in a lighter gray. Because of this, I was completely unable to finish the section. And it was a long section.

 Screenshot (23).png

4-3: After I was doing the section correctly, I opened the crime offenses attribute table and when there should’ve been 444 remaining features, there was still 3924. My SQL expression looked like the one in the book, so I do not know why this happened. At the end of the tutorial, I ended up with two people instead of just one too.

 Screenshot (24).png

4-4: This was a short tutorial and one I was able to do 100% successfully, thank god.

4-5: This tutorial was also short and I had no problems with.

4-6: Same as the last 2 tutorials. The latter half of the 4 tutorials were a lot easier than the first half.

5-1: I had no idea there were around 5200 projected coordinate systems and over 100 map projections. How would you even know what’s best for what you’re trying to do?

5-2: Again, there are so many coordinate systems and map projections.

5-3: This one was interesting. I don’t really understand why I was changing the projected coordinate systems and why this matters so much.

5-4: CouncilDistricts was not in my Chapter5,gbd, so I used municipalities because it seemed close enough. I also did not have libraries in it.

 Screenshot (28).png

5-5: This tutorial is really confusing. Column JK, which I was supposed to keep, was not the same as what the book said it should be- it was females not living in a place. And there was no column SE at all, so I was unable to do this section. When moving to the next section, I was unable to find most of the census shapefiles and I am not sure why. Because I couldn’t do this, I couldn’t do the next section. So I pretty much was unable to do this entire tutorial except downloading the data at the beginning.

 Screenshot (30).png

5-6: Eliminating the land use for everything else other than just the county is interesting. Actually looking at the data is really cool though, and seeing the difference in development. Also, ground features wasn’t an option to symbolize the elevated contours layer for me, so I just changed the color to a similar one instead. I am not the biggest fan of the textbook assuming we know how to do everything we previously learned 100% perfect, as I don’t have the best memory.

6-1: This one was fairly easy and makes sense why this would be useful.

6-2: I am unsure of how to export the selected features as UpperWestSideBlockGroups to Chapter6.gdb. Also, I couldn’t find UpperWestSideStreetsForGeocoding, so I couldn’t clip streets either.

 Screenshot (40).png  Screenshot (41).png

6-3: This tutorial seems really useful. Being able to combine all that data and clear up the contents page makes for much easier map readability.

6-4: Pretty much the same as the last tutorial. I have the same thoughts on it too.

6-5: I do not see SUM_Street_Length in my attributes table, only Street_Length. I’m pretty sure I did this section right so I’m not sure why it’s not appearing for me, even when the table is refreshed

 Screenshot (44).png

6-6: I don’t think I joined the tables right at the end. I didn’t really see how I could do it, clicked around and found something called join, but got a lot of null sections. I wish the book could explain in more detail how to do some steps, because even though it’s later on in the book there’s so much information that its hard to remember it all.

 Screenshot (45).png

6-7: I liked the background behind this tutorial. It reminds me that GIS is used for really important and possibly life-changing information, like separating the disabled people in half between 2 fire companies so in the heat of the moment no one gets left behind because of not remembering.

7-1: I don’t know where a constructions toolbar is, so I couldn’t click the add button and move the vertex points of the art building. I had issues with splitting the buildings too, but this is probably just a me thing.

 Screenshot (47).png

7-2: It took me awhile to do this tutorial, as working with these polygons was finicky for me, but I eventually  was able to do everything in the tutorial.

7-3: Well this tutorial was easy. I can understand how smoothing out the polygons can help with viewer comprehension.

7-4: I feel like this is something I would never remember how to do. It looks pretty cool though.

8-1: For me, the rematch addresses pane doesn’t have a “pick from the map button”, so I couldn’t finish the “rematch attendee data by zip code” section. The next section, “symbolize using the collect events tool” didn’t work for me either, as when I tried to run the tool I kept getting “collect events failed” multiple times, even with changing some things up.

 Screenshot (50).png

8-2: My only issue with this tutorial is that the basemap, World Light Gray Canvas Base, didn’t load for some reason. Otherwise this one made sense.

 Screenshot (51).png

Chapter 4
4.1- This tutorial felt pretty simple in comparison to chapter 3, and I was able to complete all the steps easily.
4.2- After calculating the PopYouthUnder20 field, I received a warning and several of the values were labeled as null. I am unsure as to why this happened. This also occurred while calculating the PercentPopYouthUnder20. I believe this might have interfered with the rest of the tutorial.
4.3- I found this one to be pretty easy to understand, but also pretty repetitive.
4.4- I appreciated how short and straightforward this tutorial was.
4.5- I didn’t struggle at all with this tutorial, and found it to be enjoyable.
4.6- I got confused on the “your turn” part of the tutorial, as I was unsure what table it was wanting me to open as the usual attributes table was not an option. Because I was unable to add this new code, I was unable to complete the tutorial.

 

Chapter 5
5-1: This tutorial was very straightforward and easy to follow, and I was able to complete it in just a few minutes.
5-2: This one was pretty much the exact same as the last tutorial, so it only took me a few minutes. However, I noticed that the program seemed to struggle with loading all of the states, as it took about a minute or so to fully refresh.
5-3: I found this one to be relatively boring, as it was mostly just confirming if already existing settings were correct. However, the California UTM map did not load.
5-4: It worked properly.
5-5: The link and download did not work properly, and had a very long waiting time. I was unable to complete this tutorial.
5-6: I was unable to access NLCD, even after verifying that I was logged into ArcGIS Online and restarting the app.

 

Chapter 6
6-1: I got stuck on the “your turn” part, as the Pairwise Dissolve tool kept failing. I am pretty sure I inserted the information correctly, so I am unsure as to why this problem occurred.
6-2 – 6-3: Fairly uneventful and easy to go through. The main part I struggled with was understanding when I needed to search for a file to input, or simply name the field. The book wasn’t very clear on this.
6.4- The book did not clarify which append tool to use, so I had to guesstimate. I think I used the right one in the end.
6.5- I found this one to be fairly easy, and I didn’t encounter any errors.
6.6- I found this chapter to be very repetitive, as it was mostly “Open this table. Now close it”. I did get a bit confused on the joining step, but I was able to figure it out in the end.
6.6- It seems like the tracts layer for the second map was not working.

 

Chapter 7
7.1- I actually found this one to be interesting and a nice change of pace. It was enjoyable to see my actions immediately have an effect on something tangible.
7.2 I was able to complete the work and found it interesting
7.3- This tutorial was easy to follow and only took a few minutes.
7.4- It was really cool to see how the map transferred into the tiny version, though I’m very happy the text had pictures because the wordings were very unclear.

 

Chapter 8
8.1- This tutorial went smoothly, and I found no errors or continuity flaws in the text.
8.2- Everything worked well in this text, and I was able to finish it quickly.

4.1- Couldn’t get the tracts to paste inside of maricopatracts. The paste button was not available. 

4.2- Didn’t do the second step (zoom to layer) but got through half of it before encountering more problems. My tracts table did not look like the one in the book. Then arcgis pro crashed and tracts was lost. 

4.3- My dot map didn’t turn blue. It still stayed multicolored. Got the code correctly. 

4.4- Fully completed. Only one page long 

4.5- Simple. 

4.6- Saw the difference in the hierarchy tables. 

 

***I had problems downloading data.

5.1- Complete. It was cool to see a different perspective on the map. 

5.2-.4- Completed easily. The shorter chapters are easier to understand because there’s not a lot of steps to mess up on. 

5.5- I got the first part downloaded in the folder, but I couldn’t extract the second part from data.census.gov to the folder. It downloaded the table but there was no way to put it inside the folder. 

5.6- I entered the data but it didn’t outline the county. My only options were land use 1 or 2. I added the data for Minneapolis into my drive but when I went into ArcGis Pro it didn’t show up when I hit add data. 

 

6.1- Struggled to find manhattan neighborhood, but found it eventually. Complete. 

6.2- Complete. 

6.3- Easy. Only had to do one thing. 

6.4- Done.

6.5- Done. 

6.6- Complete.  It was cool to see the different areas on the map. 

6.7- This was probably just a me problem, but I couldn’t find fire company 76. 

*This chapter was mamangable. Most of the tutorials were on the shorter side, which makes it easier. 

 

7.1- Little confused about this tutorial. 

7.2-  I made my red parking lot in the middle of a field. And then I drew the red over the parking garage. 

7.3- My map didn’t look exactly like the one in the book, but it was very similar. 

7.4- Got the different shapes and colors to match. Complete. 

 

8.1- Fairly simple. It was nice to see Ohio finally being used in GIS. I liked the street view. 

8.2- Complete. The first thing I did, didn’t change the map at all. So, I probably didn’t do that right. But the end result looked like the photo in the book.

 

4.1 – My youth population gbp did not have a tracks feature class in it but it had cities and PopYouth so I just finished the tutorial using only those two.

4.2 – I don’t like how objectID is also known as fid, it was confusing. Also, my attribute table also did not look like how the book showed.

4.3 – This section was really hard for me to understand, I feel like it took me way longer than it should have.

4.4 – I liked this tutorial because I feel like this will be good to know in the future. 

4.5 – I also liked this tutorial because it will be nice to know in the future. I also find graduated symbols interesting so it was fun to see a new way to use them.

4.6 – This section was interesting because I had to apply my knowledge from the first part of the chapter and it was fun to see what I am able to do with loose instruction.

5.1 – It was interesting to see the different map projections that are used. 

5.2 – This section feels like 5.1, it was also interesting for the same reason. 

5.3 – I liked getting out of the GIS software and going back to the arcgis.com to learn new ways to utilize the website within the software. However, a lot of this section was redundant with just having to check which coordinate system a lot of the different layers were using. 

5.4 – In the contents pane, there was no right click option for Display XY data, instead, i had to use XY Table To Point in Geoprocessing to get the same results 

5.5 – Column JK is “Estimate!!Female!!Workers16yearsandover!!PLACE OF WORK!!Not living in a place – column EG was the right column

• Column SE was not the right one for female, IQ 
• I did up until Join data and create a choropleth map. I could not for the life of me figure out how to export the data into Chapter5.gdb and was not able to continue through the section because of that

5.6 – After downloading the data for Bicycle Count, and converting to points, it says that there is an error for every data point and it won’t let me create a graduated symbol layer because of it.

6.1 – This section is cool because it combines stuff from previous chapters while adding new details to them. 

6.2 – I like the select by location filter, it was really fun to use.

6.3 – The Merge feature tool is really easy to use, but I had a hard time finding it at first and tried to use the wrong Merge tool. 

6.4 – I feel the same way about 6.4 that I do about 6.3. The Append tool really easy to use, but it was hard to find due to the kinds of append tools. 

6.5 – It was cool to see a new type of tool, however, I don’t know in what other context I would be able to use this tool. 

6.6 – This section was interesting, but my Calculate Geometry Attributes tool settings didn’t line up with what the book was saying, but it was close enough where I was able to still figure it out. 

6.7 – I feel like a lot of these sections are doing the same thing, I know they aren’t, however, all of the tools are getting conjoined in my head because of how similar they are and I will have to go back in the book to differentiate between them.  

 

7.1 – I really like the move feature. It’s cool how you are able to just pick up a polygon. 

7.2 – I also liked this section, it was it was simple but definitely useful information to know

7.3 – Smoother features tool adds a better appearance to the map and it is fun to do. However, I don’t like how it makes a new feature instead of just changing the original one. 

7.4 – I have used AutoCAD in the past, and it was interesting to see how it can be used inside of ArcGIS.

8.1 – This section was interesting to see and do because of the amount of data points that it has, it was cool to sort and fix zip codes.

8.2 – I feel similarly about this section and 8.1, it was fun to play around with the different address points. 

Chapter 4: 

• 4.1– This was pretty straightforward and easy to understand. I learned how to create a new project and add necessary data. 
• 4.2– This started off strong but then I couldn’t find how to turn off base maps. I struggled to find the information in the tracts portion of this section. Therefore I just continued on to the next portion. I didn’t understand this tutorial, I think I might have messed something up or didn’t understand the wordings. 
• 4.3– This was a good section and it went smoothly. I felt that I was able to get a grasp of the concepts and what was happening. 
• 4.4– Short and easy. I was able to input the correct attributes and get the correct table. 
• 4.5– Easy to understand and straightforward. My map looked like it was supposed to and I feel confident in my ability to use this type of information. 
• 4.6– This section was easy to understand and wasn’t too difficult. 

Chapter 5: 

• 5.1– This was really cool to see the change from a flat map to a curved map of the world. 
• 5.2– I understood this section. I don’t know if this was just the program but when I would zoom in some of the states would disappear then reappear.
• 5.3– the beginning was easy. However once I got to the California UTM I couldn’t see anything on my screen. 
• 5.4– When I was working on the KML Data I got a notification at    the Geoprocessing layering failed. Not sure what went wrong. 
• 5.5– I struggled with the excel sheet. I couldn’t find the columns that were to be kept. For instance in Column JK it was (Estimate!!Female!!Workers 16 years and over!!..) whereas in the book it stated that Column JK Was (Male!!Estimate!!MEANS OF TRANSPORTATION TO WORK!!Bicycle). I couldn’t Finish this tutorial because I couldn’t get the data correct from the excel sheet resulting in me not being able to download and upload the file to ArcGIS Pro. 
• 5.6–  Straightforward and I understood the process of downloading shape files and inputting them into ArcGIS.

Chapter 6: 

• 6.1– I couldn’t do the pairing dissolve portion with the fire battalion. I am not sure why but It wasn’t running. I understood the process though. 
• 6.2– This wasn’t too difficult, however I did get stuck on the last portion. It wanted to pairwise cut but the correct file wasn’t on the dropdown menu therefore this process couldn’t be completed.
• 6.3– The process I am understanding but when I tried to merge the information for the waterparks, the system wouldn’t run the merge. I am not sure what I did wrong but I followed the previous directions. 
• 6.4– This section wasn’t too bad. I understood the concepts and found this easy to add the information into the attribute table. 
• 6.5–  This section was straightforward and I understood what I was working on.  
• 6.6–  I liked this section and it was going smoothly until the very end where I couldn’t merge the Brooklyn information together properly. 
• 6.7– Straightforward tutorial. I messed up with the running of the tool at the end but I figured out that I needed to select the file from the folder not just the dropdown menu.

Chapter 7: 

• 7.1– This one was easy and straightforward. I understood what was going on. 
• 7.2– This tutorial was going smoothly until I got to the part with the configure toolbar. I looked for it and couldn’t find it therefore I skipped that portion. After that the rest of the tutorial wasn’t too bad. 
• 7.3– Quick and easy. However when it got to your turn section I couldn’t figure out how to save the file into the folder. 
• 7.4– Pretty straightforward. However at the very end I couldn’t transform the building to the smaller version. The transform button didn’t show up. 

Chapter 8: 

• 8.1– I ran into an issue with the properties of the PARegion ZIP. However, after I smoothly got through the majority until getting to the rematching the addresses. I couldn’t figure out how to complete that because when I went through the steps it would just open the attribute table. Once I skipped over that step the rest of the tutorial went smoothly. 
• 8.2– This was straightforward and I understood the concepts.